Episode 276 - Navigating Apprenticeships With Angela Mitchell & Shop-Ware Scholarship Winner Kaitlyn Schave

0:00For years, the automotive industry has been plagued with the perception of shady business practices, greedy owners, and incompetent technicians. It's time we flip the script. Good clap, David. I'm very proud of you. I don't know if you know this, but this is not a standard podcast, David. We started this podcast in order to bring everyone together to have the tough conversations everyone's been avoiding.

0:31Instead of endless complaining and pointing out the problems, we seek to get everything out in the open and look for real solutions. To do that, we bring on industry experts, vendors that are changing the game, multi-million dollar shop owners, as well as those that are struggling every single day to pay the bills, and everything in between. We're not professional podcasters pretending to know how it is.

0:56We're in the trenches every single day trying to pay the bills and hopefully achieving some success. So if you're tired of overly polished scripted conversations, it's time to tune in to the Changing the Industry podcast. Lucas and I are proud to partner with the Institute for Automotive Business Excellence as a means to help shops, whether they're getting off the ground, hiring their first technician, or looking to pass along their business to a new generation.

1:29So jump down to the show notes and check the link in the description, which will take you to their events page. The Institute is committed to bringing world-class training to shops all over the country, including their Leadership Intensive, their MARS Intensive, and the Service Advisor 3-Day Intensive. Some of these events take place all over the country. So jump down to the show notes, click the link, find an event near you, and experience world-class training unlike anything else you've seen.

2:03And now onto the episode. I either need to do additional testing or here's my recommendation based on what I have available. Okay. Evidence-wise for it. That makes sense. I know that doesn't sound like 6 steps or 5 steps or whatever. It's concern. Confirmation. What is it? Correction. Correction. Consequence and consequence. Consequence is the last one. No correction. There's 2. Concern. Cause. Correction.

2:38Obviously, you need to go to the classes again. Yeah, it's been a long time. Well, I was just curious because I was like, he just made it seem like everybody knew that. I've never heard it referred to that. Like, because everything is clear. Everything you explain, like, it makes sense. That's what we do day to day to day. But I didn't know there was a name for it.

2:54There isn't. The the there's a three C's, and then some some teachers will push a five C, which is adding two confirmations: the confirmation, the initial confirmation, and then a confirmation of the of the correction. Right. But when you come to these classes, you'll always have somebody that's like, and you're like. All right, dude, like, nobody does that. Yeah, this is in your head.

3:23You have made this up entirely because that's how he was taught, and so he passes along like it's the gospel, and he has no idea. That's why I was just concerned. I was like, why do we not— is there a name? What it— what is he talking about? Because of course he didn't expand on it. It was just like throw it out into a room of 100+ people and— yeah, well, but I mean, like, you got to remember some of these people, they're they really are, um, blowhards.

3:52Well, they're— it's more that they're, they're fishing for engagement. Does that make sense? They're fishing for— they're fishing for relevancy is what they're like. I want to show everybody how much I know. I was gonna look. I think I've got the 5 C's. I can't sit there because Chuck said he'd heard of the 3 C's and the 5 C's, and he's like, yep, that makes sense.

4:12But he's It was just when we hear stuff like that and we go back and we talk about it and we're like, why do they do that? Is there something we're missing? Should we look into that more? So like in her brake class today, they were talking about anti-seize on the brake caliper, like to provide a barrier. What was it? On the bracket.

4:34And we don't do that. So it was talking with Chuck like, why do they do this? Like, and he basically said— Did they tell you to do that? Anti-seize on the bracket? On the bracket between the— yeah, between the bracket and the hardware. I'd say I don't do that. I— and, and here's why I don't do that. No, I don't know. They, they make it very clear, like if you go to an actual brake class where— this was a brake class.

4:59What? Who was putting this brake class on? That was here. That was this. Yeah, but who was doing it? I don't remember. I'll have to go back and look and see. But that was today because then we talked about it and was Then they said something about anti-seize on the brake pad ears, and we definitely don't. There's— they use grease, like, and like half of our shop uses one kind.

5:19What do you guys— what do you use? I use the orange stuff. The orange stuff. And one uses white lithium. So like, do you own the shop? I'm not in charge. I just take the money. So yes, I am an owner, but Chuck's in charge of how those processes work. I'm the boss, he's the owner, 100%. So like, when she— like, you have to standardize what you want done in your shop though.

5:43Like, you can't have like, well, half your shop using one goo and the other shop— because the— at the end of the day, the product has to be consistent to your standards because it's your name on the product. Yeah, it's great that Technician A is doing the work, that's great, but it— you have to look at it like a factory line. Like, as they're building the iPhones, the one iPhone builder is like, I like to use this kind of silicone and I like to use this other kind of stuff.

6:12It's like, no, Apple has a standard. This is how it's built. Everybody just abides by that. So this one that's over here that uses his own stuff and has used it for 30-plus years, he's on the way out. So that is definitely like a contention. So Chuck has a really big heart. And yeah, to our detriment. Yeah, that has to stop. But that one, like, tomorrow you hand them like, this is what we use now, and if you don't use that, you can go.

6:38Well, and I know that they were using it quite a bit, and it was just something that was used the entire time. And then we started having brakes that were coming back squeaking. This is— that's my point, is like, when you have inconsistencies in the processes, as something as simple as brake pads, you're going to have differentiators in the outcome and, or differences in the outcome.

7:00And then you're going to have complaints and then you have to like, who did this brake job? And it always comes back to technician A ends up doing the brake job. And then technician A, it's not his work. It's the brake pads that you buy or it's the rotors that you use. Like, no, we buy the same pads and the same rotors from the same company.

7:17This is what we use on every car that comes in the door. We have a, we have a consistent process that we go through. We have the same chemicals everybody uses. We have— again, everything has to be standardized to a certain point. There can be nuances in the methodology, like some people like to take the bracket all the way off. Some people like to swing the bracket up.

7:39I don't care as long as everything gets cleaned and lubricated because that's part of the process. And we use this brake cleaner and this lubricant. And that's it. We— so we'll use one of two things. Like, you get everything torn down, and we'll either use a needle scaler or we'll use a wire brush on the bracket itself, right? Because we want it to be clean and to where you can move it.

8:02Now, some caliper brackets have coating on them, and you don't want to take the coating off, but where we're at, they get super rusty, right? Now, what you end up having happen is you put the hardware on, and two things that will happen is, especially where we're at, you'll have that hardware pushed back up because it gets rust between the hardware and the clip itself.

8:21And so we take a very, very, very thin, almost like you can't even see it, layer of like actual brake grease and we put it on there just to keep it to where that corrosion doesn't build up. And so the hardware will sit flat and flush, and then we'll put just a little tiny touch of lube. Now the brackets themselves, or the clips, if you notice the ones that have like the black coating on them, They're actually like a slide coating, so you don't have to put grease on those.

8:45It's only the silver, like bare metal ones that we put just a touch of grease on to stop corrosion and slow it down. Because if, I mean, like 30,000 miles, they have to rotate. So we have to watch that. We don't have corrosion issues, but if you use the wrong goo, the goo gets gummy and will dry up, and then the brake pads stick.

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10:00And then you've got And anti-seize also contaminates the F out of everything it touches. And so if you get some anti-seize on your fingers and then you touch the brake pad, now you have brake noise or chattering or pulsation issues. There's all sorts of nonsense. Just people get overcomplicated brake jobs. We use the ACDelco silicone because we have found that that never, ever, ever gums up.

10:29Like 60,000 miles on front brake pads, the car comes back in, brake pads still have 3 or 4 millimeters left on them, the goo still is gooey. Yeah, like it doesn't gum up with soap and water. I don't know about you, but we wash our brakes with soap and water. We don't use brake cleaner, just— but we have a brake pad or brake rotor break-in conditioner that we spray on the rotors.

10:52Yeah, uh, light dust the metal. And that completely stops noise issues because it breaks in the pad material on the rotor. We never have brake issues, brake noise. And the rotors that we use are high carbon steel rotors. So we don't have any— So that's the difference. If you— I have a hard time with getting correct brake rotors or quality brake rotors.

11:16So he's using a lot higher quality rotor than what I can get in a timely way. So you're using offshore, just off-the-shelf brake rotors. So, so long. Have to wash them and scrub them is because when they're machined, they don't clean them. They put a coating on the outside of them. The metal shavings, if you just use brake cleaner, it's charged electrically.

11:34Like, it has— yeah, it won't get it all out. And so when you play, it causes the metal to stick into the blood coat itself. So if you put that, put that on the car and you go out and you don't bed the brake, don't go through the whole process, you're going to end up with noise. If you wash it with soap and water first, it's going to keep them from squeaking when you get done.

11:50And then burnishing techniques, right? Like, follow burnishing techniques. Sorry, introduce yourselves. I'm Angela from Tenpenny. Angela, I'm the boss. I'm Caitlin. Caitlin is ready to murder me at this point. I mean, there were a couple times that I'm walking around that party last night and I could feel her staring at me saying, I wish this dude didn't— that was me. Sorry, I'm sure both of you.

12:19Um, Caitlin, I'm sorry, I just felt like, you know, I wanted you to know some of the— listen, I'm just going to point out that the first— somebody had won the scholarship and then they call him up and they're like, hey, we just gave you this whole thing, like, and he's like, yeah, great, but part of the deal is the— it's also marketing, like, we have to show off that we did this thing for— yeah, to help the industry.

12:43Yeah, absolutely. And he's like, yeah, I'm not doing any of that. Oh, I'm sorry, what? Yeah, I don't want— I don't want to be on— I don't want to be in pictures. I don't— okay, you're just gonna— didn't either, but it didn't work out that way. No, this is complete— he definitely didn't tell us about this part. And I was like, oh, I was like, well, maybe, maybe you got out of it.

13:02Like, we have to do the other things. Like, we talked about it. So Emily had called me and she's like, hey, Caitlyn's in the top 5. Is she willing to take pictures and, you know, talk to people? And I'm like, let me ask her. Put them on hold. And I look over across and she's like, what did you do? Like, remember how I was talking about how I entered all of you guys in this nomination thing and I was asking you more questions about why you want to be in this and do all that?

13:33I was like, remember that? And she's like, yeah. I was like, you're in the top 5. And they need to know if you're going to cooperate. And she's like, I guess. See, I went back. I'm like, absolutely. She was nice enough to ask. I wouldn't have asked. I would have been like, yep, whatever. I'm not going to lie. As I was calling you, so I'm recording those telephone calls, right?

13:57And as I'm calling you and like by the 4th time I called, I'm like, she is going to rip me a new asshole. She was close. Yeah, and I'm like, I'm gonna call her, and she— and it would be viral content. Like, it would have been funny. Yeah, you should have cussed. You should have cussed at him. I almost did. No, that would have been good.

14:16So the behind the scenes was you were calling her, then you messaged us, and I'm texting her. I'm like, all caps, like, Caitlyn! And she's like, what? Like, answer the phone. She's like, no. I'm like, you know it's them, just answer the dang phone. I watched it ring every time. I guess I deserve that. So, uh, you— last night, uh, we were at the ShopWerk party and I tried to make sure that I introduced you into some really cool people.

14:50What did you think of that? Good, good. So one of those people was Luke Murray. And Luke was on the show recently and he talked about what apprenticeships really were. And I think that that's a really powerful thing because I think that a lot of shop owners hire apprentices and they don't really understand the responsibility they have in teaching you and guiding you and getting you to that next level.

15:15Um, what did you think about, think about some of the stuff that Luke shared with you? Was it valuable? The one thing that really stuck with me, and I know with you too, was like curiosity. Yeah, be curious. Don't let— yeah, don't let it hold you back. Absolutely. And I, I think that that's when I started, because we talked about it as soon as he walked off.

15:37We were standing there talking, and I'll never forget my very first diagnostic job with a scope, right? It— yeah, I still remember it like it was yesterday. Um, I had a Motus, an old Motus, and it was one that when you turned it on, it made all these cool clicky buzzy sounds. Did you ever have one of those? Um, no. And man, it was such a cool scope.

15:57And I was literally completely blind going into this, had no clue what I was doing. But I had an old Ford Focus, and the deal was, is you'd be riding down the road and the speedometer would peg, the check engine light would come on, it would say it had a misfire, but it didn't have a misfire. And all this weird stuff was happening, and I had no clue what to do or where to go, right?

16:18I had not found Paul Danner at point. And so I'm just like fumbling through this trying to figure it out. And I bought this tool and I said, you know what, I'm going to check powers and grounds. And I hooked up to the grounds and I'm just going through base. I think at the time I was on PCM and I'm in PCM grounds and I'm like, dude, there is no way this PCM has 400 volts on the ground.

16:40That's crazy. Like, that's not possible, right? And so then I started changing the time base And I'm like, I know what that is. And so I went out and I found out the ignition coil was cracked at the bottom and the ground was connected to the same bracket the ignition coil was on. And so that was causing the cluster and everything to go haywire.

16:57I had a bad ignition coil, right? So it was leaking spark to your top end and that's causing all the problems. And I was hooked. Is it one of the ones with the coils on the side of the head? Yeah. And so like that, that was when it started to change for me. And then I started grabbing the scope and I'd go out to just cars that were completely fine.

17:16And I would, because the cool thing about the scope, right? Like you learn that you don't need the scope to diag 99.9% of the cars. But what it does for you is it teaches you and allows you to see the electricity and you begin to understand what it's doing because it's a visual representation. A lot of technicians are visual learners, right? So you can see that, you begin to see how it does what it does.

17:38And then you get hungry for that knowledge and you start looking more and more and more. So what made you want to get into automotive? I don't really know. I know I wanted to be able to work on my own vehicles. Okay. And my dad's side of the family, they all did demo cars. So I'd help out with that once in a while.

17:58I think doing that really pushed me more towards it. Right. And then tell us how you got here. Tell us about the story of how you ended up in a shop. And oh, you guys are hiring and I was looking. I didn't like where I was at. So when we took over ownership of the shop about almost 3 years ago, um, we had a technician that 2 weeks before we said, hey, we're buying this, he put in his notice he was going to a dealership local.

18:28Cool. So we're already down one person. And we had a lube tech that has a bad back. He couldn't keep up with the work. He'd be out for a week at a time with zero predictability for us. So it was really hurting us as we're stepping in and taking over. So we had posted that we were looking and we had a couple people come in that over-exaggerated 1,000% of their abilities and we're like, Yeah, no, like you could tell right away within the first 5 minutes that it wasn't gonna be a good fit.

19:03And then we got an application from Katelyn and it wasn't like, oh, she's a girl. It was, she was very quiet, very reserved. You could tell she was a little uncomfortable, but we tried to make it very, very friendly, very kind of laid back. Like, hey, this is kind of how our shop runs. What do you know? And she was very upfront.

19:24She's like, I really don't know anything. So we knew that we either need to pay a lot of money for someone maybe with bad habits from a different shop, and we would kind of have to poach someone, or Chuck would take that effort and put it into starting someone new from the ground up and give them a good, a good skill set to kind of build off of.

19:46And if they outgrew us, great, we'd just do it again. So Caitlin is about 2 and a half, almost 2 and a half years in, and she has been such an asset. We kind of throw her into the deep end sometimes on jobs, stuff a little bit above, but she has that support with Chuck that's just unmatched. I mean, she gets a ton of value out of that.

20:09I don't know at her age if she understands how much he puts into her. Ridiculously proud of that. I mean, we do a lot of oil coolers on Chrysler vans, like, um, and normally we would only put that with our, our senior tech who's been there since '89, um, but his hands just don't manipulate very well anymore. Um, and so Chuck's like, well, let's give it to Caitlin.

20:34And she had never done one, kind of supported her through it, would check on her. Um, she'd come in and ask them questions and then go right back out. She's right there on Identifix looking things up, um, come in and ask them more questions, go back out. I mean, her first oil cooler job she did at book time. Wow, that's impressive. And now she does it faster than book time, and we're just like, here, go do this.

20:59Like, we don't put it with our senior tech anymore. So when we're handing her stuff like this, um, you know, one of the things when we talk about sending our employees to training. We love, love getting them more training, getting them out there and learning more things. One of the things we had talked with Luke about last night was kind of the gray area from baby apprentices, I guess I would call them, where they're like, they've never touched a car and you're just learning basic things versus your master techs that don't remember what it's like to be that.

21:32And there's that gray area in between, like, how do you learn? You're either way in the deep end with some of these trainings, with stuff way above where they're at. And he said, throw her in. Yeah. And what she had mentioned is he said, be curious. Yeah. Go out to that vehicle that's running perfect, or when you pull it in for an oil change, throw the scanner on it and monitor that data.

21:53Yeah. Every time, because then you know what it's supposed to look like. So when you have one that comes in, you can immediately pinpoint it. Hey y'all, Lucas here. It's story time. Over the past 6 months to a year, I've actually been working more and more in the family business. Now, the family business is not an automotive business. It's a tourist attraction.

22:11And one of the things that was happening in that family business is we were doing all of the marketing internally, be it social media ads, be it Google, all of it. We were handling all of it— website building, the whole 9 yards. And here's the deal: it became very clear our marketing efforts were ineffective. Now, we could see that we weren't getting return on investment.

22:29We could see that we weren't getting good conversions. And that's when we stepped in and hired someone. We hired a professional that knew what they were doing, and for the first time in years Our parking lot's full when it's typically empty. And that's why I'm going to recommend you pick up the phone today and call Shop Marketing Pros or click the link down in the comments below, because you shouldn't be learning how to do marketing.

22:49Your marketing machine should be working for you right here, right now, making sure your bays are full. So go into the link in the comments and click on the Shop Marketing Pros link for your free marketing analysis today. Point and be like, hey, this isn't normal. So he shared that with her last night. That was Awesome. You know, the cool thing about being in a workforce like this is, I mean, like, don't you understand, like, Luke Murray is the top of the top when it comes to technical training in this industry, right?

23:16Like, he is one of the best there is, and his understanding what it takes to help you learn is probably some of the highest out there, right? And so that's one of the cool things about coming to Vision and going to all these other events is like you're able to access those people, the people who have massive amounts of knowledge. And Luke's got a really cool story.

23:36If you ever— he's, he's been on the podcast and told that story. You ever get a chance, really cool. So go check that out. What's not out yet? Is it not? No. So what— let me ask you this, and, and I know she's sitting right there, um, and, and like, I want you to be honest. I know that would be hard. How do you feel about all this?

23:56Not just coming to fishing. How do you feel about the responsibility that's been placed on you, right? We just had a young tech here. Here's why I had a young tech in here. And he said, hey, he said, I got thrown to the wolves. I got thrown in. He said, that's what they were doing. It's because they loved me, cared about me.

24:12They were trying to do a really good job for me. But it came very, very, very heavy for me. Like I felt overwhelmed and I felt like a need to show them that I can do this and like try. I didn't want to let them down. That got heavy. Right, right. He said it was— it was not a big memory. He said I had to take a step back.

24:28All right, guys, I've got to slow down here a little bit. I'm not feeling good, right? How do you feel about the, the responsibility that's been placed on? Well, it's overwhelming. It can be. Yeah, yeah, for sure, for sure. How do you handle that? Do you communicate that with them? Oh, I suck at communicating. No, you do. I do. You really don't.

24:50You think you do, but you really don't. So when you're struggling with something and you feel we've given you something way too much, what do you do? Panic. You do panic? Yes. And then you come in and you find— do you ask me? No. Who do you find? Chuck. Right. And then he'll ask you a series of questions usually, and then he kind of lets you figure it out.

25:15He doesn't just hand it to you. But he will point you, and then if he really sees you struggling, he does come back out there. And the repetition of, okay, now we've had one of these, let's do it again. Yeah. He gives you that time to fail first instead of just making it easy. And I think that your confidence is something that holds you back, and we've talked about that a little bit.

25:40She's amazing. She knows how to find this stuff. It's way easier if we hand it to her, but I don't think he's ever put her in a position where she's like struggled so hard where she's like, hey, I'm not coming back tomorrow. Yeah. Have you ever considered? I've threatened it. Walking out the door. I think, I think the are more shop dynamics with some of the other technicians.

26:05It is hard for her. You're, you're a female. In a male-dominated industry. You're a young female in a male-dominated industry. And the credibility— I mean, we had a lady come in. We were almost a year in, and Caitlin had been there more than 6 months. And this woman walked in and she said, hey, who's doing my oil change today? And I was like, she is.

26:31She's like, no, I want to talk to a mechanic. And I'm like, yep. Whatever you like need to, you know, have addressed, you know, we can take that down, write it down. She'll, she'll address it as, you know, and if we need something else, we'll let you know if we need to reschedule. And she walked— Caitlin walked out the door with her keys to go get her vehicle, and that woman looked at me and she's like, does she even know what she's doing?

26:55You know, like, well, actually she does. No, it's like, no, this is her first day. You're her first car. It'll be fun. It's hilarious because that little old lady— oh yeah, it was, it was an awful experience with her when she came. Caitlin finished the oil change. That was gonna happen. You don't walk into a business and start like— I don't look back there and go, who's cooking my food?

27:18Like at the Chinese restaurant, that guy's Mexican. I don't want him. Where's the Chinese guy to cook my Chinese food? You would be amazed at what little old people get away with saying. They don't have a long life to live. Oh, wait till I get really old. Oh man, like really old, like an old shaky. It's gonna be bad. I'm gonna say the most like cracked out, off the wall shit.

27:38It's gonna be fantastic. Considering the cracked out shit you say now, I could only imagine. Yeah, it'll just be more racist though. Oh yeah, I could see that. Well, so, uh, you know, I had, I had a gentleman come in one time and tell my wife that her place was in the kitchen. And that he didn't understand why she worked in an auto repair shop.

28:00He did not appreciate that I carried him out the front door of the shop, but I did carry him out the front door of the shop. That was the last— didn't he owe you money? Yeah, he did. I just said whatever. Um, well, did you break her radio? I didn't know how to turn it back on. It was so loud on talk radio that Caitlyn turned it off because Caitlyn works on our drive-on lift So like, you can't have stuff blaring at you for that.

28:27So she turned out just for that, by the way. Like, I hate drive-on lifts. They're the worst. She loves it. Oh yeah, yeah, you don't gotta deal with rusty frames. Yeah. Oh yeah. Where are you guys located? In Wisconsin. Oh, why? Because then I look at Florida and the things that could eat me. I'm like, no thanks. Wisconsin's actually— Wisconsin's really pretty.

28:49Yeah, yeah. Have you ever searched Florida Man and put in your birthday? No. Yes. You should do that at some point. It's pretty effective. Very effective at learning just how crazy Florida is. What do you, Caitlin, what do you want? To keep my job. Well, I mean, you're going to keep your job. How old are you? 23. She's 23. 23. Did you have things figured out at 23?

29:18Oh, hell no. I ain't got things figured out now. Oh, see, there you go. Why are you asking her then? No, I'm just asking what she— I know, like, what do you— what would make you happy? What is this? What's going to make you happy, working on cars? Is that— some days. Other days I question it. A lot of days I question it.

29:35Yeah, but yeah, the challenge is part of the fun. Like, if the job isn't challenging then it's the worst job ever. It's part of the fun. Like you, you kind of just, you need the challenge cuz otherwise you get intellectually, like mentally you get lazy and you get complacent. But some people do like that. And those are usually the worst people. They're just underperformers and they don't, they don't wanna make waves.

30:02So they're just really quiet and they just, they just do the bare minimum. Those are the worst people. You don't wanna have 'em working for you, working in, in your organization anywhere near you. You don't want, walk and messing with your stuff? Obviously not. I'm just saying, like, you don't want to be that. So you sort of need it to be hard, um, as long as the hard is something that you enjoy.

30:24If in the difficulty you get satisfaction in finishing the work and you're like, that car left, and you're like, yes, I did that, like that, then that's, that's enough. Um, she likes working faster than boys. Oh yeah, she gets faster than boys. Great joy out of doing jobs faster than their boys. Yeah, they're boys. You should hear the comments. Oh yeah, especially Chuck.

30:53Chuck will dance across the shop and just do like weird, like creepy walker things across. Or when he jumped up and hit the doorway in the office trying to scare you. Yeah. Chuck is a hoot. He's a hoot. And Cade, you, you met Cade. Yeah, they're, they're crazy. But when she can do jobs better and faster than the boys, oh yeah, there is definite gloating in our shop.

31:19And I know we've asked her like, what do you want to do? And she's kind of like, I don't know, a little more in-depth, like curious, kind of leads more towards like engine diagnostic stuff. Not really electrical. Electrical is kind of like, no thanks. Intimidating. Yeah. But I think you're going to have to get over that. I know. There's so much of it that's electrical now.

31:44Like, you're just going to have to get past that. You need to try to push yourself to do the learning on your own after hours. Because that's going to be like your freest time to, to sit down and, and just go through material. And then if they're giving you the opportunity to mess with stuff at work, then that just reinforces what you learned the night before.

32:09But like, you know, he tells the story about him sitting down and starting to watch all the Scanner Danner videos to go through the material so he could get better at diagnostics. Like, I— anybody that calls and like, I want to get into the industry, this, that, and the other, like, I want to I'm trying to save up to go to school.

32:26I hate when they tell me that. It just drives me absolutely bananas. It's like, dude, you're gonna get $25,000, $30,000, $40,000 into debt, plus they make you buy the tools to walk out of there. You know what they teach you? How to not die. The camera stopped recording. I'm sorry, did it really? Keep going. They teach you how to not die. That's it.

32:46Like, how to not kill yourself, how to rack a car that's rusty. Yeah, well, I think that was so valuable last night with Luke. Um, being connected up with Luke is now she knows about the Lunch and Learns. Um, and we have that extra of, hey, we can look into what classes they have so she can do that evening, evening trainings and stuff for herself.

33:08Yeah. Um, and give us another avenue because when you do the NAPA Apprentice Program, like, they work at their own pace. Yeah. Yeah. Like we check in, we're like, yep. Okay. Mentor, mentor approves that. Yep. You're proficient in this and you move on and you get to a certain point and it's okay. Now you need to go for training. Well, you're not supposed to pass them until you're through that.

33:30So then what do we do in that interim? So I, I think, I think Caitlin, I think my biggest worry for you is like, I think you're gonna have to get up for yourself. And I'm not, I'm not saying you guys treat her poorly or anything like that, but I mean, but I mean, you're gonna have to be able to, to vocalize and, and be firm and be strong about like, hey, no, I'm not doing this, or I am going to do this, right?

33:56I think you're going to have to get to the point that you're pushing that and, and communicating back to them and setting your boundaries with them, right? Because like one of the things that, that, and I think business ownership taught me this, but as an employee, I also saw it the same way, right? Is that I, I was not setting those boundaries.

34:21And it's hard because you look at an employer and you say, I work for them, I'm just supposed to do whatever they say. It's not necessarily the case. Like, it's your job to set boundaries. No, I'm uncomfortable doing this. I'm not going to do this. And You explain why. Well, hold on. Now the problem though is that you, if you like, if I let my employees tell me what they're not going to do, like, I'm not saying because they're going to be like, oh, I don't want to do that, or I can't do that, I'm uncomfortable doing that.

34:47Like, I would— I— you got to go the other direction. You got to be vocal about this is like well within my wheelhouse, you need to let me do more of this. For sure. But I mean, that's kind of what I'm saying though, is that both directions, she needs to be setting boundaries and saying I'm uncomfortable with this, Because if she doesn't communicate with them and say, I don't look, you're putting me on something I am very uncomfortable with and I've not learned on, then they want— how's she supposed to learn?

35:14Well, that's what I'm trying to say. Learning comes with time. Yeah. Learning comes with time, but it also comes with them providing the resources so she can get the training in the area that she needs it. They don't want to put her on something she's super uncomfortable doing because it will burn her out. And then she'll say, no, you know what? Fuck this.

35:30I'm out. Right? She's— I, I worry that— I don't know, that's just a really fine balance there. It is. I'm just worried that she's so quiet that she would not say, hey, I'm just gonna let it— this— and she would overwhelm. And then— oh, don't be, don't be fooled. Like, she's quiet here. We are very vocal and very comfortable at home with telling Chuck what we will or won't do.

35:55However, I don't think I would really get anybody in our shop to cooperate about wanting and jumping for joy over doing heater core that you have to rip the dash out of. So I mean, I mean, those are great, great hour jobs. Yeah, absolutely. I don't know why they take so long. I mean, Caitlin was out there like, oh, it was like 10 hours.

36:13I don't know why. Should have been in like 5. I just saw laser beams go across the table. Oh yeah, yeah, no, she, she's definitely vocal. Um, I'm gonna need you to be more vocal here. Um, and, and like, you know, what do I have to do to make you mad enough to like really get vocal? That's— do you sell the evaporator with the one with the heater core every time?

36:38Yeah, yeah, those are the estimates. I don't do it sometimes. Blend door actuators? Oh yeah, no, we do it all. Like, and I know some people— the one guy actually said, why are we doing that? And Chuck went through the process of explaining this is another common failure. While we're in there, you just have the extra cost of the part. Otherwise, if it fails 6 months from now, you're paying me to do this again.

37:00And the guy said, absolutely do it. Done. The trust our customers have in our shop, even walking in and seeing apprentices working with us, they don't question it. We have an amazing customer base. So what's— because it's Wisconsin, there's a nice up there. They have good milk. Cheese curds and coffee. Cheese and some, uh, more of those beef sticks. Jason. Yeah, I've not caught up with him yet.

37:29Um, how, you know, if, if somebody were to ask you, because one of the things that we hear a lot of is like, uh, apprentice technicians come in and it's almost like the owner has unrealistic expectations of them, right? I don't think you're in that situation. I think they're pretty understanding. Right? But they'll, they'll come in and they'll think, okay, I'm gonna put this person on flat rate in a year and I'm going to expect them to turn all these hours.

37:53I'm gonna expect them to be proficient. Do you guys play flat rate at all? No, we're hourly. Yeah, I mean, that's probably the— yeah, and that's gonna make a big difference. We're hourly. And then obviously with being part of CTI, like, we have looked into and we're planning to move to like pay incentives. Um, I know sitting in Matt Wegg's class yesterday He was kind of talking about how they structure a little bit of their pay incentives for certifications and different training and what their expectations are of their techs to be constantly training.

38:22And that's something we've already talked about with Chuck back home, you know, via the phone, talked with Caitlin, like who doesn't wanna make more money? Like changing what our expectations are so that everybody in the shop is continuing to grow. And that there's a financial benefit to them. Absolutely. Um, we— I don't like Matt Wack. I don't. Is this another one of those, um, uh, Minkler conversations?

38:50No, no, we had a whole podcast with him. The entire podcast I tried to sour him on shop ownership because I think he was like a year in or something like that, and he was like— he was too happy and positive about life and this, that, and the other. Screw that guy. I get messages about this. Do you? How long do you?

39:15He did tell that story about that. Do you remember this? He told the story about the Ford F-150, and he's like, "Well, I did have this situation," and he like he goes into how like how upset he was, and this customer was unhinged, and he was trying to make it right. He's bending over backwards, and the guy just wouldn't have him. He— I think he ended up working out, but at least I got him to like admit that there was— no, at least I like— I took him there to the dark spot of shop ownership.

39:43This is my thing, okay? This is what I do for a living. Listen, if I'm gonna— if I'm gonna teach you one thing at all, if you just walk away, do not go into shop owner. They're nuts. But I was against it. I'm just saying, putting it out there, you can tell Chalk Like, absolutely. I was like, he did not say that on our podcast.

40:03I was kicking and said it was your idea. Absolutely not. Absolutely not. No, I don't recall that. No, no, don't be throwing them on the bus. We, we told, we told them, we're like, hey, it's probably not a good idea to hire a bunch of apprentices. It'll make life really difficult. That's why Caitlin dislikes us. What's that? She just likes you. Oh, she doesn't know who I am.

40:30See, I think it was amazing. She, not so much. I don't like it either. I don't like it either. I do the same thing. Yeah, but we had, we had told him like, it's, it's gonna make your life pretty difficult. And he's like, yeah, it's okay. Like, you make more work for you. He's like, yeah, it's okay. Yep, but we're still in the that's okay I'm gonna remind him of that when I call him later and be like, hey, remember that conversation from November where you were like, yeah, it's fine, it's fine?

40:58So, uh, fun story, about a month after we got back from Apex, we hired another youth apprentice. Oh, so we have 3, but that one's, uh, I don't know, it's quiet. That is the most positive thing. I'm totally gonna group chat that. Oh, what? She did like When you talk about her, he's better than the other 2 you've had. Yeah, we, we've had 2 others, um, from the high school.

41:26Um, you know, we bring them in, they work side by side with someone, and they wanted to be in it for different things. One was just, he just needed the money, um, and he's— I wouldn't even say he's mechanically inclined, um, just kind of all over the place. And it— I'm glad that that ended and that he moved on because he needed to move physical locations.

41:49Um, super, super kind kid, absolutely hard worker, just lots of like potentials for mistakes. But because we have someone right there with him, never left him independently. Like, it's almost every day that I hear shop owners talk about credit card processing and credit card processing fees, and I'm gonna tell you right now, if you're that worried, you're stepping over dollars to pick up pennies.

42:13What do I mean by that? When it comes to credit card processing, it's all about the service, it's all about the support and the great rates at the same time. And that is exactly why I use 360 Payments for all of my payment processing needs. They are the best payment processor in the automotive space. So don't wait, go to the link in the show notes and get set up with 360 Payments.

42:39They're integrated with all of your favorite shop management softwares, and it makes your life so much easier. It was okay. We didn't ruin anyone's car. Um, the second one, he, he needed hands-on experience. So, um, he is actually a student, um, in Ohio for a like Formula 1 engineering program. So we knew out right away that he was not going to stay.

43:12He had no intention of doing it. He just needed to kind of learn the basics of how do you change the oil, how do you rotate tires, so that way he wasn't completely clueless walking into the engineering program on some of this stuff. When we offer, oh, you're coming back for break and you, you need to change your brakes or do an oil change, do you want to come in after hours and do that yourself?

43:33No thanks, I'll just pay for it. That's kind of where that one was at. So then we were reached out to again by the high school instructor. He said, hey, I have this kid. We had brushed it off and we're like, no, we're not really looking, kind of a little hesitant right now on how that's gonna work. And we got to the point where we're like, okay, we need someone to kind of come in help with odd jobs.

44:00We'll teach him some of the basics, see how that goes. And he has a background in small engines. His family runs a small engine shop, so he definitely has a different skill set than the other ones have had. He is so positive. Like, even when the rest of us are grumbly because he's coming in partway through the day and it's been a long day already for the rest of us, he comes in, he's like, it's gonna be a great day.

44:24And we're like, He's like, why is everyone so grumpy? Yeah, he's just so happy and he goes out and he'll help whoever and he just, he fits in so well that Caitlyn actually kind of likes this one and she's not like immediately staring death daggers at him like the other 2. I, you know, I think that women mature much more quickly and at a much younger age than men.

44:52Uh, my, my first apprentice was Bridget, and Bridget was amazing. Fantastic, fantastic, fantastic technician and employee. Um, she wanted to start a family though, and it, it didn't— like, what she wanted to do and where her fiancé was and everything else, it just wasn't the right fit, right? And I hate that. Drives me nuts. And then I started hiring young men from the high school program and they just were not mature enough.

45:22I couldn't trust them and I couldn't trust that they were going to do the job they were supposed to do. And I couldn't trust that if I turned my back on them for half a second. And we got one that like made me really nervous. I was afraid he was going to get hurt. I mean, this kid would be on his phone standing behind a car that's backing up and the car would bump into him before anybody realized he was there.

45:39He'd sit on the floor behind a car and it's like, dude, what if they go to move the car? They're going to run over you. I didn't know. You gotta be fucking kidding me, right? Like, seriously. And so I, I, I don't, I don't know what it is. I, I would, I would trust you before about 99.99% of the young men in the high school automotive program.

46:02I would give you a job substantially faster than anything. Are you hiring? Yeah, sure. I'll send her. Take her. She wouldn't last a week with you. You'd be like, oh hey, let's go do this, we're gonna record this. And she's like, absolutely not. Yeah, this is Lucas all the time, so never mind. Yeah, this is who I am always. Um, and, and if you think that me dragging people over to you to talk is bad, it's like, hey, by the way, I'm gonna have you up on stage there.

46:31Uh, just go right ahead. They put some on social media as technicians. They look super happy. Jackals looks super happy to be answering your stupid questions. Poor Eric. Man, Eric, I think Eric likes it. Eric likes it. Eric likes it. So, um, Eric had this situation. There's a really like super duper famous YouTube technician, and he was like, and Eric misquoted something by like, I don't know, a year.

46:59And this dude called him out, and Eric like sent me text messages day and night for about 2 weeks like, man, do you really think that I missed that? What about all these people saying that I missed that? And I'm like, bro, Like, you can't put yourself on social media if you think that's bad. Like, I promise you should see the things that I'm blocking that people say about you.

47:19You know, like, you don't want to know. You never read the comments. Don't read the comments. Um, what, what's the future look like, Caitlin? No, don't ask that question. I hate that question. What classes have you been taking other than the brake class, which still was apparently a disaster? She took the GS before that, and then it's like way below what she's— that's for like— who signed you up for these classes?

47:43Me. So when they reached out to us, they said, hey, we signed her up for the general 2-day, and then it was, you know, but you're— you have the whole weekend pass. So Chuck and I looked at, um, the Friday, Saturday, or the Saturday, Sunday stuff and kind of were like, okay, where do we think she would fit in not wanting to give her something so far above her that she would get no value out of it, because anything that she intakes, like, she would go back and ask Chuck anyways.

48:16So we kind of weighed out stuff, but we didn't know exactly what the last 2 days were going to be. And I know Chuck and I talked about it when I read the course description, like, I don't know that this is appropriate. I think I think it's not going to be valuable, like especially day one. I was like, what is she really going to learn?

48:36I mean, she's 2 years in, so I think jumping through the most difficult. Yeah, that's exactly what you said last night. And I'm like, I would have thrown her in like all the communication classes and lab scope classes. Like, I want to just have fun. Listen, you got to get exposure to it. And at the very least, even if you don't understand, you'll start to pick up the terms and you'll at least get a grasp of some of the concepts.

49:07Or you might get down, you think it's this whole different world, you think it's like rocket science, you sit down, you're like, this isn't that difficult. Yeah, it's pretty simple. This is pretty simple. For sure. And I think that's where you find yourself, right? So don't let it overwhelm you. Are you doing it again or Dana? Never heard of it. This is on you.

49:32On me? Yes. So I'll take, I'll take the hit for Chuck and I. Okay. All right, so let me explain this. I know, I know who it is. Well, that's good. I was, uh, I had the shop, right? And I was fixing cars. Doing everything myself, but I was not a very good diagnostician. And I realized that like, hey, I'm gonna have to get good at this because nobody else around does this.

50:00And I happened across Paul's channel, right? Right. And so 99.9% of all diagnostic skill that I have, I learned from Paul. And what's cool about Paul is because Paul teaches you about the concept of diagnostic work and testing and, and, uh, universal testing methods. And so these testing methods, they work on washing machines, they work on cars, they work on motorcycles, they work on buses, they work on trucks, they work on everything, right?

50:28But it is an entire drivability course that's on YouTube and his premium channel. And it's like, he doesn't just take you and say, okay, you need to learn this, this, and this, and this about working on a car. He says, all right, here's this car. And here's this problem. And so here's what this means. And so he's got a book and it goes chapter by chapter by chapter by chapter.

50:52And it starts with the most basic and simple things. What's a switch? What's a thermistor? What's a transistor? Like, what does each thing that you're going to encounter do and how does it work and why does it do what it does, right? And so he starts with these very universal methods. And when you start looking into this, you're watching this video and he's like, okay, so I've taught you what this is.

51:12So now I'm going to show you this in real world, real practice. Here's this car and it's got a thermistor installed in it. It's called a coolant temperature sensor. And we're going to go over how it works and how we're going to test it. And here's what happens when it doesn't work. Here's what happens if it has one in your car. You can look at the data and see this here, this here, this is what it causes.

51:30Right? Right. And so then you watch this video and then the next day you go out in your car and you're like, hey, I'm trying this out. Let's see what happens. He's like, hey, You're not going to hurt any car. The car, if you test lights, ground it, and connect signal wires, it's going to make it think it's this temperature. Watch what it does to the car.

51:47Watch how the car is, right? Right. And so then you realize that I can manipulate things in this car to make it do something that I want it to do to understand, is this the problem, right? One of the big things for me was, is like, I had the hardest time understanding Not necessarily fuel trims, but I would always try and understand, is the data that I'm getting accurate or not?

52:12So let's say that I've got a rich condition or a lean condition. I learned from him, force it rich, force it lean. There's a way to do that. Do that. And so you can tell, is the sensor reading correctly? And it just makes these things flow a lot faster. And so it gets you out of this realm where it's like, I don't feel comfortable with testing.

52:30I don't feel comfortable with diagnostics. It gets you moving to a spot that it's like, this makes sense to me. You know what I mean? It's really cheap. It's like $100 a year or something like that. And you can get a whole shop pass. Yeah. And put everybody in it and you can get the book and put her on the book and just let her sit there and read.

52:49I'm going to tell you, it's going to be life-changing for you. Like it will really open your eyes. He's a good instructor. And then he's got, I don't know, 18,000 videos of case studies and situations like him diagnosing vehicles at his brother's shop using the stuff that you learned in the book. So you're going to be able to go like, oh, I see how this was practically applied and how he went through his diagnostic process.

53:15And then hell, half the time, if you've got a car that comes in with a particular problem, particular code, whatever, Like you can search for a video that he's done on it and you can go through his process and then you can try to mimic the process yourself at your shop on that car to try to come up with a diagnosis yourself.

53:36And you'll find that that's the fastest way to learn diagnostics is just to go through that and then apply it on a daily basis. That's, that's so valuable. So I think one of the things we struggle with as owners is weeding through all the resources that are out there. Like, would it have been more cost effective for me to throw her in, you know, that, that scenario where we're doing training at home with ScannerDanner information?

54:04Absolutely. That's one of the first things we'll talk about when we talk with Chuck later is, hey, there's this, there's the Lunch and Learns that Luke was talking about yesterday. She's probably going to get way more out of that than than the brake class she took this morning. And it's just one of those things. Just that brake class. And I see it.

54:23I'm really curious who taught that class. Oh, they were talking about alignments in the brake class. So I mean, just kind of all over the place. And it's hard to, to know what's credible and what's not if we're putting it in front of them because we want to maximize their time and also not waste a ton of money on stuff. That, that's just not appropriate or not credible, or I'm sending her off to a break class to learn stuff where we're like, oh, timeout, hold on, unlearn, unlearn all that.

54:53Yeah. What you'll learn is that they, it's normally the instructor. If you, if you go through the course list, like I don't look for, I mean, at least when I used to select class, I don't really mess with that anymore. But when I used to go through the classes, I didn't look at the class name or the topic. I'd look for instructors.

55:12Like, oh, Keith Perkins. Yeah, Tanner Brandt. Yeah, okay, 100%. Jim Morton, like, yeah, 1,000%. And you just— you just— his very last class. I know, isn't it crazy? If you want like some old school, like top-end, best of the best diagnostics, like if you get into it like hardcore and you're like, you just want to geek out, you look for some old 1995 Jim Morton videos of him doing and him like talking about diagnostics.

55:43He's, he's, he's got the tism, like 100% he's got the tism. But like, he, he's encyclopedic about the knowledge, and he just starts spitting through information, and you're just trying to keep up, and your brain's like, yeah, let's stop, rewind. Yeah, rewind. And you'll, you'll learn crazy— like, some of the stuff that I learned was like, always check the battery first. When you start any diagnostic process, he's like, I fixed 50% of the cars that came in with batteries.

56:13He used to run a diagnostic shop. That's all in the '90s. That's all he did. And he would come in and they would fill out an intake sheet and it would have this huge questionnaire of like, when does it do it? What temperature? Are you turning to the left or to the right? Is it making any noises? This, that, and the other.

56:31So he gets as much information from the intake sheet as possible. Then they dropped the vehicle off with a giant deposit and he's like, okay, you'll get back when you get back. And then he would go through and just diagnose, diagnose, diagnose, diagnose. And he didn't fix anything. He would just diagnose the car and then give it back to him. Here's the diagnosis.

56:49And then they would go get the car fixed somewhere. He's like, yeah, I fixed half the cars in the shop with batteries, batteries. And this was in the '90s. You can just imagine how many bad batteries floating around causing problems now. On cars. And so, but the way he would test the battery though, wasn't with a battery tester. He would use a lab scope and he would start the car 6 times.

57:13And on the 6th pull, he would see how much of a voltage drop it would be on the battery. And that would tell him that that battery in a real-world situation with an actual load on it Is it keeping up with what it needs to, and is it holding up like it would you would expect the battery to? And he would sit there and watch.

57:33Do do do do do do do do. And on that last pull, if it dropped under a certain voltage, I think it's 9.6 volts, if I remember right. Yeah. If it dropped below that, battery's bad. Now there could be still another problem, but 100% he's diagnosed the battery is 100% bad. Yeah, like I need a fresh battery. It's got to be 100%.

57:54For me to continue the diagnosis. And half the cars were fixed after he put a new battery in it. And so like that, that I learned from a 1995 video, Jim Morton doing a lecture. I don't know, that stuff used to geek me out. Me too, back in the day. I loved it. I hate working on cars. I hate working on cars.

58:13I don't work on cars. Yeah, yeah, but that stuff, that stuff used to— he loves That stuff, that stuff is what used to interest me, and that's the kind of stuff that I used to love to learn. Uh, but you know, it's me learning on my own. It's not, oh, I had to go to this class or somebody had to teach me.

58:33It's like you got to go hunting for the information. There's a lot of resources out there, right? And you can take it wherever you want to go. And, and that's the other thing I would encourage you is like, you might, you might wake up one day and say, I don't want to turn wrenches, I want to do diagnostics, or I don't want to whatever.

58:50There's still tons of opportunity no matter where you look that you can go towards, right? We've talked to people here who were technicians who now run tool companies. We've talked to people here who were technicians and now own shops. People who have moved into service advisor roles. People who have like multi-billion dollar corporations based on loving automobiles, right? So don't lock yourself down.

59:15Don't shut yourself down and say, hey, this is the only thing I can do. You know what I mean? There's tons of opportunity for you. And challenge yourself a little bit. You might find that you're like, you get really into ADAS. Just like, you may not know anything about ADAS right now, but you get into ADAS, you start learning how the systems work, and then all of a sudden you're like, I've got a knack for diagnosing ADAS systems.

59:39You guys may not run into a lot of it, but just having that skill set and just honing that skill set will make you incredibly valuable for the next 20-plus years. Yeah, absolutely. Well, I know that, like, she kind of looked at me funny when I said it because I said something yesterday about it for sure. Um, Chuck and I aren't, aren't pushing her because we're like, hey, you need to learn this so you grow our business.

1:00:07We're pushing to make her a little uncomfortable so she gets more value out of it for her career because she's probably going to outgrow our shop. Yeah. Do we wanna do a buttload of diagnostic in our shop? Absolutely not. 'Cause right now it's Chuck and he wears too many hats. So with mentoring and bringing up other apprentices, like she said, probably gonna outgrow us, and that's okay.

1:00:30We absolutely want what's best for her and whatever she wants to do, if that's diagnostic, if it's engine work, whatever. Dude, I don't know, why do you keep saying that they're gonna outgrow you? Like, what does that even mean? Because I don't want to do diagnostic in our shop. What? We do some of it, but right now with what— what if she gets really good at it?

1:00:48Well, maybe she wants to stay. I don't know, she might want to. What? Listen, listen, facial expression I just saw over here. Yeah, I'm just— don't— like, you're— you, you are limiting yourself the way we're telling her not to limit herself by thinking like, oh, we're not going to do that. Do you know how much— I mean, like, cars need diagnostic work.

1:01:11They do, they do. We see it a lot. What happened? That battery died. The big deal. Battery died? Yeah. What battery? What do you mean? In one of the receivers. Oh, that's not good. Yeah, it's okay. Anyway, sorry. No, we're not trying to pigeonhole ourselves or like limit right now. It's kind of a balance of what we can take on and what we're turning away.

1:01:35Sure. Um, but that's because you're lacking the skill set within the shop. But if she develops and all of a sudden she gets into ADAS, like, and you guys have the capability to go buy the equipment and You know, making smart choices in the purchases. Don't spend $60,000 on equipment that you never use. Don't do that. If you make smart choices, but you expand the shop out to accommodate her interests.

1:02:05And then at that point you're like, oh, you outgrew us. No, screw that. That's insane. She's going to, she's going to own the shop, right? She's just gonna— yeah, she's gonna— no, no, I just told her like, don't— customer service at the front end, she's gonna love it. I have no customers. Can we, can we get video? Like, what? I, I think that would be really good.

1:02:27Listen, listen, if you put yourself on video but just being mean to the customers, there's gonna be a whole like niche in there of people just wanting to watch you just be mean to the customers. And run them off. Absolutely. And be viral. And I'm just telling you, you make all this money on YouTube being mean to the customers. We're just gonna put Caitlyn at the front counter.

1:02:52That was my one year working at AutoZone where I could be rude on the phone and they couldn't do anything about it. See? Plus I was a manager, so— You worked at AutoZone? Yeah, that's why I left them. She worked at, uh, O'Reilly's, right? What's that? She worked at O'Reilly's, right? No, no, it's the same, same. Yeah, I mean, I think they're all crap personally, but that's just— they're all, they're all a dumpster fire.

1:03:23But you're like, you're saying that she can't go work customer service? Like, do you know what you do at AutoZone all day long? All day long? Obviously she can do it just fine. She can, she doesn't want to. Well, I get that, but you know, working a weekend, a Saturday morning at AutoZone, trust me, will sour you on the whole customer thing.

1:03:47The worst thing is when it's rainy and cold and grown-ass men walk in there and they ask the 21-year-old girl behind the counter, will you put those wipers on for me? I— now, you know, this wasn't the misogyny thing, but it was me like, no, I'll go ahead and take care of that for you, and then mean mug the guy the whole time I'm out there.

1:04:14Like, you put your coat on? No, no, I'm not. I'm a grown-ass man. I hope I'm gonna beat these wipers on for you. Don't worry, don't worry. Break a nail for fruitcake. Freaking people. This is why we need to bring the camps back. I'm just saying, that guy right there, back him out to the camp, dig some ditches. It's good for their character.

1:04:38It is. Yeah, I love you. You're amazing. See, she likes me. I do. So we had a call, obviously Wisconsin snow, it cooled out This guy calls, and you can tell, like, he's, he's younger. Like, I, I talk to people all day long. He's definitely younger. And he's like, hey, he's like, I need air in my tire. And I'm like, okay, how, how can I help you with that?

1:05:07And he's like, well, it's cold outside and I don't want to put air in myself. I was like, oh. I said, well, everybody's on lunch, so I can't help you right now. Do you want to swing by tomorrow and we can put air in? Oh no, I wanted it done now. Sorry. Terrible, guys. Thank you for being here. It's been awesome. It wasn't awful.

1:05:35What? Gee, thanks. Worse than AutoZone? Hi. Oh, that was mean. Yeah, that was cruel. That was like bad. Thank you for listening to the Changing the Industry podcast. If you enjoy the show, do us a favor and leave us a review on your favorite podcast player. And don't forget to set it to automatically download the latest episode. Our efforts with this podcast, the YouTube channel, and the Facebook group wouldn't be possible without the support of our awesome sponsors.

1:06:09So please take a moment, check them out by clicking on the links in the show notes. Notes.